An encounter with St. Elmo’s fire before Operation Just Cause

It was a dark and stormy night…

No kidding it really was very dark and very stormy. I was out at sea with my first mate in a small gas-engine-powered army patrol boat. We were attempting to link up with a group of Green Berets returning from a long-range patrol in kayaks. The location was roughly 25 nautical miles off the coast of Panama weeks prior to the U.S. invasion of dictator Manuel Noriega’s pitiful excuse for a country.

We were to pick up the Green Berets – sink their kayaks in place – and rush them to the intelligence collection quartet to dry land for a reconnaissance debriefing.

Heavy thunderstorms and vicious squalls nipped menacingly at our heels. Every time I felt sorry for myself I thought of the men in their very vulnerable kayaks braving the swells and lightening crashes, both of which were abundant.

We bobbed and tipped in the restless sea waiting for a signal from our recon force to appear. I hated being out in waters like those, and despised it for our kayakers who were no doubt fighting a capsize at every trough and crest. I came to jones for a radio contact from our Forward Operations Base (FSB) to double and triple check our contact coordinates. We were in the right place.

We were mercilessly pelted with bullets of rain sprayed down on us from obstreperous squalls just ahead of the thunderhead clouds. Lightening cracked like dry macaroni, illuminating the ocean around us for hundreds of meters. We strained to spot our reconnaissance troops but then the flashes graced us with chance.

I raised our lightening rod of an antenna to attempt radio contact with our FSB. The moment I raised it only a few inches I heard a humming noise begin a crescendo. I paused at the sight of a greenish-yellow light that began to dump from the mast of the raising antenna. The higher I raised the antenna, the louder the hum and the thicker the green light became which was now pouring from the mast.

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At its peak, the light resembled a fountain spraying up and dumping off from the circumference of the antenna mast. The hum was loud and distinct. The air around us was electric and both of us locked a fearful expression together. Holy hell, just what was this apparition?

I lowered the mast slowly and the phenomenon slowly dissipated. I raised the antenna again just to check, and it certainly belted out more green light and the raspy hum resumed. I lowered the antenna a final time leaving it to lay quiet.

The storm relented eventually; our field of view widened and range of visibility increased dramatically. We instantly became aware of a flashing light, ironically green, pulsing at a distance of a mere 150 meters. We took four reconnaissance men aboard our vessel and their two kayaks became a line item on the inventory sheet of Sir David Jones’ Locker.

What I saw was for certain an electro-plasma event. Whether it was St. Elmo’s fire or not I reserve for a later petty quarrel. I saw what I saw and am a better man for it. We accomplished our mission and that is all that mattered when the moon came to set that night.

By Almighty God and with Honor,
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Feature Image: Saint Elmo’s Fire is traditionally a blueish or violet glow seen emanating from at the tips of the masts of galleons and other ocean-going vessels. The phenomenon has invoked awe for centuries. Science has since sucked all the romance out of it by explaining it.I boast the privilege of having seen it in a rare state of not the violet end of the spectrum but rather in the yellowish-green band. Elmo’s fire nonetheless t’was, and I saw it with my own eyes! Here St. Elmo’s fire is seen over Georgia, USA, December 2021. (Photo by Afronolan/Wikimedia Commons)

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